The FDA is cracking down on marijuana products marketed as cancer cures.
The agency has sent a letter to four companies, slamming their unsubstantiated promises that patients can treat life-threatening tumors – and even prevent Alzheimer’s – by using cannabis oils and creams.
While medical marijuana is now legally prescribed for many ailments in more than half of the United States, the FDA warned that no studies have been done on these products to test their disease-fighting properties.
The firms – two in Colorado, one in Florida and one in California – now have two weeks to remove the claims from their products, or pull the products altogether.
The FDA cited four companies, including That’s Natural, in Pueblo, Colorado, which tells customers their products (pictured) ‘actually kill cancer cells’
‘The FDA has grown increasingly concerned at the proliferation of products claiming to treat or cure serious diseases like cancer,’ the agency said.
‘Selling these unapproved products with unsubstantiated therapeutic claims is not only a violation of the Federal Food, Drug and Cosmetic Act, but also can put patients at risk as these products have not been proven to be safe or effective.
‘The deceptive marketing of unproven treatments may keep some patients from accessing appropriate, recognized therapies to treat serious and even fatal diseases.’
All of the products cited by the FDA use CBD, the relaxant property of marijuana, rather than THC, the psychoactive property which stimulates a ‘high’. Neither property can be legally distributed without a prescription.
The CBD product cited including oil drops, capsules, syrups, teas, and topical lotions and creams.
Green Roads in Pembroke Pines, Florida, tells customers that ‘almost all studies recognize CBD’s potential in preventing both cancer spread and growth’. Pictured: one of their products
Stanley Brothers Social Enterprises brands its hemp oil (pictured) as ‘anti-tumoral’
Natural Alchemist, based in El Dorado Hills, California, tells visitors to its website that cannabinoids combat tumor and cancer cells
And all four of the manufacturers – Green Roads, Natural Alchemist, That’s Natural and Stanley Brothers – market their products with claims that they may prevent, reverse or cure cancer by killing or reducing tumors.
Green Roads in Pembroke Pines, Florida, tells customers that ‘almost all studies recognize CBD’s potential in preventing both cancer spread and growth’, and ‘CBD oil can potentially be therapeutic for: asthma, Alzheimer’s disease, arthritis, autism, bipolar disorder, various types of cancer’.
Natural Alchemist, based in El Dorado Hills, California, tells visitors to its website: ‘Cannabinoids are found to have particular application… in limiting neurological damage following stroke and trauma, or in the treatment of neurodegenerative diseases, such as Alzheimer’s disease and Parkinson’s disease.’ It also says the products ‘combats tumor and cancer cells’.
That’s Natural, in Pueblo, Colorado, says: ‘Scientific research by doctors have shown it actually kills cancer cells and provides a protective coating around our brain cells.’
Stanley Brothers Social Enterprises, in Colorado Springs, says: ‘[C]urrent studies have reported that CBD is showing promise in how oncologists are looking to treat breast, glioma, Leukemia, thyroid, colon and lung cancer.’ It also brands its hemp oil as ‘anti-tumoral’.